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Hello all, Mary Ellen here. Big holiday today for us—National Quilting Day! What quilty thing will you be doing today? Making a sunflower block? Sewing a binding? Picking out a new project? Passing on a quilt to a loved one? Cuddling up under a cozy quilt with a cup of tea and a good book? All good ideas…do you have any other good ideas for us? Add them in the comments!  

Hello all, Mary Ellen here, We had a very productive planning meeting this week. I’m so happy that many ladies are participating in this project. Everyone is welcome to contribute as much or as little as you are able. Lots of completed blocks were shared at the meeting. I’m working on my first project with sunflower blocks, aiming to have a completed project to use for publicizing our raffle ticket sales at Maple weekend on March 27 at BNHV.  Here are a couple of shots of my favorite type of machine quilting. I like to use a serpentine stitch in a grid so I have very little marking to do. Have fun with this everyone and keep us posted on your progress! (The serpentine stitch helps to camouflage imperfections in the stitch in the ditch type quilting.)   These show block # 2 from the patterns shared previously on this […]

Hello all, Mary Ellen here. I’ve been working on sunflower blocks and made up this chart for myself. I find this easier that having the measurements in the midst of the text. Maybe some of you have a sewing style similar to mine and will also find it helpful.  cutting sunflower blocks

Hello all, Mary Ellen here.The patterns below are for the blocks we are hoping members will make and donate. I have included measurements to make most of the block units oversized to be trimmed down to exact measurements upon completion. This applies particularly to flying geese blocks and half-square triangles used in the blocks. If you have your own favorite methods which are different from those I’ve described in these patterns, of course feel free to use them. My only requests are that you use scrappy fabrics, and do your best to make accurately sized blocks so we can blend everyone’s blocks into beautiful projects. Don’t forget the planning meeting next week if you’d like to join us: Wednesday Mar 16 at 10:00 am in the BNHV ballroom. Block 1: Variation on Sunflower Power   click here: directions for alternate Sunflower Power block Block 2: sunflower block 2   directions :sunflower […]

Hello all, Mary Ellen here. At last night’s guild meeting we talked about the sunflowers project to raise money for Ukrainian refugee relief efforts. I will be posting the blocks and their patterns later today. I’m working on block 3-testing out my measurements and steps. I am so pleased that all 20 copies of the first 2 pattern that I had with me last evening were taken. I’m also trying to come up with an easy way for those making blocks to swap yellow fabrics with one another to make “scrappiness” easier. Also I’m going to check on the guild fabric stash and possibly accessing some yellow from there. If you would like to join us at a planning meeting mark your calendar: Wednesday March 16 at 10:00 am in the BNHV ball room. If you can not attend but want to be kept updated–as they say–watch this space! More […]

Hello all, Mary Ellen here. I’m pleased with the response to the sunflowers for Ukraine idea that I floated in my last post. Here are my tentative thoughts on how to go forward. I will be calling BNHV this morning to try to get a time soon when we could meet to talk over this project. My other guild (papercrafters) is not using our March meeting allotment, so hopefully I’ll be able to snag us a time. My tentative plan is for us to make an assortment of table runners, toppers and other small projects. When selling tickets for our guild’s bed size quilts I’ve been told different times that the quilt doesn’t match their color scheme, or that they don’t need a full size quilt. Hopefully summer/fall table pieces could find homes in many places. We’ll discuss if we want to do several small raffles or just sell them […]

Hello all, Mary Ellen here. If you’d like to make some sunflower blocks to remember Ukraine, here are some free patterns for relatively easy pieced blocks. Some are just photos, some include the steps. Would anyone like to contribute some blocks to make a project that we could use to make money to donate to a charity helping Ukranians? I’m thinking that since Ukranian refugees are expected here in Buffalo, we could keep our donation close to home. Let me know in the comments below if you’d be interested, and we’ll get together to plan. free patterns: click here  or here  or here If you search for “free sunflower quilt blocks” you’ll find lots of options.

Hello all, Mary Ellen here. I’m sure you all are as horrified as I am by the war being fought in Ukraine. I have been trying to come up with a way to help. Today I got a newsletter from the quilter Ami Simms. It’s been a long time since she visited us, but she still is quilting and crafting. She suggests that we go to the site Etsy and purchase digital crafts from Ukranian makers. She also includes a link to a charity. I’m including a link to her newsletter so you can decide if her suggestion suits you or not. Click here for Ami’s newsletter. If you learn of other reputable charities, or charitable efforts let me know and I will share them here.

Hello all, Mary Ellen here. Every year March is set aside as National Quilting Month. Guilds hold special events for their members. We will be celebrating our guild’s birthday at our meeting this month. We were founded in 1975–so 47 years for this group exploring quilting in its many dimensions. I’m finding that I make many more small quilted projects of late–wall hangings, table runners, zip pouches, etc–than the larger lap robes and bed quilts. How about you? I got out my St. Patrick’s Day/March pieces yesterday and have decided I need one or two more small pieces. This small wall hanging of a shamrock came in my Facebook feed a few days ago. It’s a quick project, and will use scraps–both get checked in the plus column. I think I might go buy a piece of felt for the backing–or perhaps I’ll stick with my resolution to use fabrics […]

Hello all, Mary Ellen here, I’ll be glad to see the end of 2021. Hoping that 2022 will bring the end of all of our COVID travails. I’ve started on a long overdue clean up of all of the fabric scraps I’ve saved. First I decided to throw away the small scraps that I thought I’d be using in paper foundation piecing. That made a lot of space in the 2 bins. I had originally divided the scraps into lights and darks–but I found that there was a lot of crossover. How light is light? How dark is dark? I now have them sorted by color–using the great big ziplock bags which I then put into the 2 bins. Novelties are in their own bag, black/gray in theirs, and browns in theirs. Do you have a good system for scraps? I’d like to get them organized into some method where […]